Deadham Hard by Lucas Malet

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happiness of the beloved object they will even donate to him theirrival.--Yes--distinctly an idea! But before attempting to reduce it topractice, she must make more sure of her ground in another direction.

During the above meditation, Henrietta continued to talk off thesurface, her mind working on two distinct planes. Damaris, off thesurface, continued to answer her.

Our maiden felt tired both in body and in spirit. She felt all "rubbedup the wrong way"--disturbed, confused. The many moral turns and twistsof Henrietta's conversation had been difficult to follow. But fromamid the curious maze of them, one thing stood out, arrestinglyconspicuous--Henrietta believed it then also. Believed Carteret cared forher "in _that_ way"--thus, with a turning aside of the eyes andshrinking, she phrased it. It wasn't any mistaken, conceited imaginationof her own since Henrietta so evidently shared it. And Henrietta must bereckoned an expert in that line, having a triad of husbands to hercredit--a liberality of allowance in matrimony which had always appearedto Damaris as slightly excessive. She had avoided dwelling upon this sooutstanding feature of her friend's career; but that it gave assurance ofthe latter's ability to pronounce upon "caring in _that_ way" was she nowadmitted incontestable.

Whether she really felt glad or sorry Henrietta's expert opinionconfirmed her own suspicions, Damaris could not tell. It certainly tendedto complicate the future; and for that she was sorry. She would haveliked to see the road clear before her--anyhow for a time--complicationshaving been over numerous lately. They were worrying. They made her feelunsettled, unnatural. In any case she trusted she shouldn't suffer againfrom those odious yet alluring feelings which put her to such shame thismorning.--But--unpleasant thought--weren't they, perhaps, an integralpart of the whole agitating business of "caring in _that_ way?"

Her eyes rested in wide meditative enquiry upon Henrietta, Henriettasitting up in all her finished elegance upon the faded blue sofa and sodiligently making company conversation. Somehow, thus viewing her, itwas extremely difficult to suppose Henrietta had ever experiencedexcited feelings. Yet--the wonder of it!--she'd actually been marriedthree times.

Then, wearily, Damaris made a return upon herself. Yes--she was glad,although it might seem ungrateful, disloyal, the man with the blue eyeshad gone away. For his going put off the necessity of knowing her ownmind, excused her from making out exactly how she regarded him, thusrelegating the day of fateful decision to a dim distance. Henriettaaccused him of being a sieve.--Damaris grew heated in strenuous denial.That was a calumny which she didn't and wouldn't credit. Still you couldnever be quite sure about men--so she went back on the old, sad,disquieting lesson. Their way of looking at things, their angle ofadmitted obligation is so bewilderingly different!--Oh! how thankful shewas Aunt Felicia would soon be here. Everything would grow simpler,easier to understand and to manage, more as it used to be, with dear AuntFelicia here on the spot.

At this point she realized that Mrs. Frayling was finishing a sentence tothe beginning of which she had not paid the smallest attention. That wasdisgracefully rude.

"So I am to go home then, dearest child, and break it to Marshall that hestands no chance--my poor Marshall, who has no delightful presents withwhich to plead his cause!"

"Mr. Wace?--Plead his cause? What cause? I am so sorry,Henrietta--forgive me. It's too dreadful, but I am afraid I wasn't quitelistening"--this with most engaging confusion.

"Yes--his cause. I should have supposed his state of mind had beentransparently evident for many a long day."

"But indeed--Henrietta, you must be mistaken. I don't know what youmean"--the other interposed smitten by the liveliest distress and alarm.

"Oh! I quite realize how crazy it must appear on his part, poor dearfellow, seeing he has so little to offer from the worldly and commercialstandpoint. As he himself says--'the desire of the moth for the star, ofthe night for the morrow.' Still money and position are not everythingin life, are they? Talent is an asset and so, I humbly believe, is thepure devotion of a good man's heart. These count for something, or usedto do so when I was your age. But then the women of my generation wereeducated in a less sophisticated school. You modern young persons arewiser than we were no doubt, in that you are less romantic, less easilytouched.--I have not ventured to give Marshall much encouragement. Itwould have been on my conscience to foster hopes which might be dashed.And yet I own, darling child, your manner not once nor twice, during ourhappy meetings at the Pavilion, when he read aloud to us or sang, gave methe impression you were not entirely indifferent. He, I know, has thoughtso too--for I have not been able to resist letting him pour out his hopesand fears to me now and then. I could not refuse either him or myselfthat indulgence, because"--

Mrs. Frayling rose, and, bending over our much tried and now positivelyflabbergasted damsel, brushed her hair with a butterfly kiss.

"Because my own hopes were also not a little engaged," she said. "Yourmanner to my poor Marshall, your willingness to let him so often be withyou made me--perhaps foolishly--believe not only that his sad life mightbe crowned by a signal blessing, but you might be given to me some day asa daughter of whom I could be intensely proud. I have grown to look uponMarshall in the light of a son, and his wife would"--

Damaris had risen also. She stood at bay, white, strained, her lipsquivering.

"Do--do you mean that I have behaved badly to Mr. Wace, Henrietta? That Ihave flirted with him?"

Mrs. Frayling drew her mouth into a naughty little knot. There wereawkward corners to be negotiated in these questions. She avoided them byboldly striking for the open.

"Oh! it is natural, perfectly natural at your rather thoughtless time oflife. Only Marshall's admiration for you is very deep. He has the poetictemperament which makes for suffering, for despair as well as forrapture. And his disillusionments, poor boy, have been so grievouslymany.--But Colonel Carteret--yes--dearest child, I do quite follow.--It'san old story. He has always had _des bonnes fortunes_."

Since her return to Europe, Mrs. Frayling had become much addicted toembellishing her conversation with such foreign tags, not invariably, itmay be added, quite correctly applied or quoted.

"Women could never resist him in former days in India. They went downbefore his charms like a row of ninepins before a ball. I don't deny apassing _tendresse_ for him myself, though I was married and very happilymarried. So I can well comprehend how he may take a girl's fancy bystorm. _Sans peur et sans reproche_, he must seem to her.--And so in themain, I dare say, he is. At worst a little easy-going, owing to hiscultivation of the universally benevolent attitude. Charity has a habitof beginning at home, you know; and a man usually views his owndelinquencies at least as leniently as he views those of others. But thatleniency is part of his charm--which I admit is great.--Heaven forbid, Ishould undermine your faith in it, if there is anything settled betweenyou and him."

Mrs. Frayling raised her eyebrows, cast down her eyes, and fingered thebunch of trinkets hanging from her gold chain in silence for a fewseconds. The ring of sincerity was unquestionable--only where did thatland her? Had not she, in point of fact, very really gone too fast? Indefeat Henrietta became unscrupulous.

Which, among her many fibs, may rank amongst her most impudent andfull-fed, though by no means her last.

Here, the door opened behind her. Henrietta turned alertly, hailing anyinterruption which--her bolt being shot--might facilitate her retreatfrom a now most embarrassing situation. After all she had planted morethan one seed, which might fruitfully grow, so at that she could leavematters.--The interruption, however, took a form for which she wasunprepared. To her intense disgust her nerves played her false. She gavethe oddest little stifled squeak as she met Charles Verity's glance,fixed upon her in cool, slightly ironic scrutiny.

Some persons very sensibly bring their mental atmosphere along with them.You are compelled to breathe it whether you like or not. The atmosphereCharles Verity brought with him, at this juncture, was too masculine,intellectually too abstract yet too keenly critical, for comfortableabsorption by Henrietta's lungs. Her self-complacency shrivelled in it.She felt but a mean and pitiful creature, especially in her recenttreatment of Damaris. It was a nasty moment, the more difficult tosurmount because of that wretchedly betraying squeak. Fury againstherself gingered her up to action. She must be the first to speak.

"Ah! how delightful to see you," she said, a little over-playing thepart--"though only for an instant. I was in the act of bidding Damarisfarewell. As it is I have scandalously outstayed my leave; but we had athousand and one things, hadn't we, to say to one another."

She smiled upon both father and daughter with graceful deprecation.

"_Au, revoir_, darling child--we must manage to meet somehow, just oncemore before I take my family north"--

And still talking, new lavender dress, trinkets, faint fragrance and all,she passed out on to the corridor accompanied by Sir Charles Verity.

CHAPTER XIII

WHICH RECOUNTS A TAKING OF SANCTUARY

Left alone Damaris sat down on the window-seat, within the shelter of thewooden shutters which interposed a green barred coolness between her andthe brilliant world without. That those two, her father and HenriettaFrayling, should thus step off together, the small, softly crisp,feminine figure beside the tall, fine-drawn and--in a way--magnificentmasculine one, troubled her. Yet she made no attempt to accompany or tofollow them. Her head ached. Her mind and soul ached too. She felt spentand giddy, as from chasing round and round in an ever-shifting circlesome tormenting, cleverly lovely thing which perpetually eluded her.Which thing, finally, floated out of the door there, drawing apersonage unmeasurably its superior, away with it, and leavingher--Damaris--deserted.

Leaving, moreover, every subject on which its nimble tongue had lighted,damaged by that contact--at loose ends, frayed and ravelled, its inwovepattern just slightly discoloured and defaced. The patterned fabric ofDamaris' thought and inner life had not been spared, but suffereddisfigurement along with the rest. She felt humiliated, felt unworthy.The ingenious torments of a false conscience gnawed her. Her betterjudgment pronounced that conscience veritably false; or would, as shebelieved, so pronounce later when she had time to get a true perspective.But, just now, she could only lamentably, childishly, cry out againstinjustice. For wasn't Henrietta mainly responsible for the character ofher intercourse with Marshall Wace? Hadn't Henrietta repeatedly entreatedher to see much of him, be kind to him?--Wishing, even in her presentrebellion to be quite fair, she acknowledged that she had enjoyed hissinging and reading; that she had felt pleased at his eagerness toconfide his troubles to her and talk confidentially about himself. Shenot unwillingly accepted a mission towards him, stimulated thereto byHenrietta's plaudits and thanks.

And--and Colonel Carteret? For now somehow she no longer, even inthought, could call him by her old name for him, "the dear man with theblue eyes."--Could it be true, as Henrietta intimated, that he wentthrough life throwing the handkerchief first to one woman and then toanother? That there was no real constancy or security in his affections,but all was lightly come and lightly go with him?

How her poor head ached! She held it in both hands and closed hereyes.--She would not think any more about Colonel Carteret. To do so madeher temples throb and raised the lump, which is a precursor of tears, inher throat.

No--she couldn't follow Henrietta's statements and arguments either way.They were self-contradictory. Still, whose ever the fault, that the youngman Wace should be unhappy on her account, should think she--Damaris--hadbehaved heartlessly to him, was quite dreadful. Humiliating too--falseconscience again gnawing. Had she really contracted a debt towards him,which she--in his opinion and Henrietta's--tried to repudiate? She seemedto hear it, the rich impassioned voice, and hear it with a newcomprehension. Was "caring in _that_ way" what it had striven to tellher; and had she, incomparably dense in missing its meaning, appeared tosanction the message and to draw him on? Other people understood--so atleast Henrietta implied; while she, remaining deaf, had rather cruellymisled him. Ought she not to do something to make up? Yet what could shedo?--It had never occurred to her that--that--

She held her head tight. Held it on, as with piteous humour she toldherself, since she seemed in high danger of altogether losing it.--Mustshe believe herself inordinately stupid, or was she made differently toeverybody else? For, as she now suspected, most people are constantlyoccupied, are quite immensely busy about "caring in _that_ way." And sheshrank from it; actively and angrily disliked it. She felt smirched, feltall dealings as between men and women made suspect, rendered ugly, almostdegraded by the fact--if fact it was--of that kind of caring and excitedfeelings it induces, lurking just below the surface, ready to dartout.--And this not quite honestly either. The whole matter savoured ofhypocrisy, since the feelings disguised themselves in beautiful sounds,beautiful words, clothing their unseemliness with the noble panoply ofpoetry and art, masquerading in wholesome garments of innocentgood-comradeship.

These sounds to our sorrowfully perplexed maiden opened fresh fields ofuneasy speculation. For those diverse accents--the speakers beingunseen--heard thus in conjunction, seized on and laboured herimagination. Throughout the past months of frequent meeting, Damaris hadnever quite understood her father's attitude towards Henrietta Frayling.It was marked by reserve; yet a reserve based, as she somehow divined,upon an uncommon degree of former intimacy. Judging from remarks let dropnow and again by Henrietta, they knew, or rather had known, one anothervery well indeed. This bore out Damaris' own childhood's recollections;though in these last she was aware of lacunae, of gaps, of spacesunbridged by any coherent sequence of remembered events. A dazzling anddelicious image, the idol of her baby adoration--thus did memory paintthat earlier Henrietta. Surrounding circumstances remained shadowy. Shecould not recall them even in respect of herself, still less in respectof her father. So that question, as to the past, ruled the present. Whathad parted them, and how did they to-day envisage one another? She couldnot make out. Had never, indeed, attempted seriously to make out, shyingfrom such investigation as disloyal and, in a way, irreverent. Nowinvestigation was forced on her. Her mind worked independent of her will,so that she could neither prevent or arrest it. Sir Charles showedhimself scrupulously attentive and courteous to General Frayling. Heoffered no spoken objection to her association with Henrietta. Yet anunexplained element did remain. Subtlely, but perceptibly, it permeatedboth her father's and Henrietta's speech and bearing. She, Damaris, wasalways conscious of a certain constraint beneath their calm andapparently easy talk. Was their relation one of friendship or of covertenmity?--Or did these, just perceptible, peculiarities of it betokensomething deeper and closer still?

Suspicion once kindled spreads like a conflagration.--Damaris' handsdropped, a dead weight, into her lap. She sat, strained yet inert, asthough listening to catch the inner significance of her own unformulatedquestion, her eyes wide and troubled, her lips apart. For might it not bethat they had once--long ago--in the princely, Eastern pleasure palace ofher childhood--cared in _that_ way?

Then the tears which, what with tiredness and the labour pains of hermany conflicting emotions, had threatened more than once to-day, cameinto their own. She wept quietly, noiselessly, the tears running down hercheeks unchecked and unheeded. For there was no escape. Turn where shewould, join hands with whom she would in all good faith and innocence,this thing reared its head and, evilly alluring looked at her. Now it setits claim upon her well-beloved Sultan-i-bagh--and what scene could intruth be more sympathetic to its display? She felt the breath of highromance. Imagination played strange tricks with her. She could feel, shecould picture, a drama of rare quality with those two figures asprotagonists. It dazzled while wounding her. She remembered Faircloth'swords, spoken on that evening of fateful disclosure when knowledge ofthings as they are first raped her happy ignorance, while the boatdrifted through the shrouding darkness of rain upon the inky waters ofthe tide-river.--"They were young," he had said, "and mayn't we allowthey were beautiful? They met and, God help them, they loved."

The statement covered this case, also, to a nicety. It explainedeverything. But what an explanation, leaving her, Damaris, doublyorphaned and desolate! For the first case, that of which Fairclothactually had spoken, brought her royal, if secret compensation in thebrotherhood and sisterhood it made known. But this second case broughtnothing, save a sense of being tricked and defrauded, the victim of aconspiracy of silence. For nothing, as it now appeared, was really herown, nor had really belonged to her. "Some one," so she phrased it in theincoherence of her pain, "had always been there before her." What shesupposed her exclusive property was only second-hand, had been alreadyowned by others. They let her play at being first in the field, originaland sole proprietress, because it saved them trouble by keeping her quietand amused. But all the while they knew better and must have smiled ather possessive antics once her silly back was turned. And here Damarislost sight of reasonable proportion and measure, exaggerating wildly, herpride and self-respect cut to the quick.

It was thus, in the full flood of mystification and resentment, CharlesVerity found her when presently he returned. Sensible of something verymuch amiss, since she stayed within the shadow of the closed shutters,silent and motionless, he crossed the room and stood before her lookingdown searchingly into her upturned face. Stubborn in her misery, she methis glance with mutinous, and hard, if misty, eyes.

"Weeping, my dear? Is the occasion worth it? Has Mrs. Frayling thentaken so profound a hold?" he asked, his tone mocking, chiding her yetvery gently.

Damaris hedged. To expose the root of her trouble became impossible underthe coercion of that gently bantering tone.

"It's not Henrietta's going; but that I no longer mind her going."

"A lost illusion--yes?" he said.

"I can't trust her. She--she isn't kind."

"Eh?" he said. "So you too have made that illuminating little discovery.I supposed it would be only a matter of time. But you read character, mydear, more quickly than I do. What it has taken you months to discover,took me years."

His frankness, the unqualified directness of his response, thoughstartling, stimulated her daring.

"Then--then you don't really like Henrietta?" she found audacityenough to say.

"Ah! there you rush too headlong to conclusions," he reasoned, still withthat same frankness of tone. "She is an ingenious, unique creature,towards whom one's sentiments are ingenious and unique in their turn. Iadmire her, although--for you are right there--she is neither invariablytrustworthy nor invariably kind. Admire her ungrudgingly, now I no longerask of her what she hasn't it in her to give. Limit your demand and youlimit the risks of disappointment--a piece of wisdom easier to enunciatethan to apply."

Lean, graceful, commanding under the cloak of his present gentle humour,Charles Verity sat down on the faded red cushion beside Damaris, and laidone arm along the window-ledge behind her. He did not touch her; beingcareful in the matter of caresses, reverent of her person, chary ofclaiming parental privileges unasked.

"In the making of Henrietta Frayling," he went on, "by some accident soulwas left out. She hasn't any. She does not know it. Let us hope she neverwill know it, for it is too late now for the omission to be rectified."

"Are you laughing at me?" Damaris asked, still stubborn, though hispresence enclosed her with an at once assuaging and authoritative charm.

"Not in the least. I speak that which I soberly believe. Just as someill-starred human creatures are born physically or mentallydefective--deformed or idiots--so may they be born spirituallydefective. Why not? My reason offers no scientific or moral objection tosuch a belief. In other respects she is conspicuously perfect. But,verily, she has no soul; and the qualities which--for happiness ormisery--draw their life from the soul, she does not possess. Thereforeshe sparkles, lovely and chill as frost. Is as astute as she is cold atheart; and can, when it suits her purpose, be both false and cruelwithout any subsequent prickings of remorse. But this very coldness andastuteness save her from misdeeds of the coarser kind. Treacherous shehas been, and, for aught I know, may on occasions still be. But, thoughtemptation has pretty freely crossed her path, she has never been otherthan virtuous. She is a good woman--in the accepted, the popular sense ofthe word."

Silence stole down upon the room. Damaris remained motionless, leaningforward gathered close into herself, her hands still heavy in her lap.Could she accept this statement as comfort, or must she bow under itas rebuke?

"Why," she asked at last huskily--the tears were no longer upon hercheeks but queerly in her throat, impeding utterance, "do you tell methese things?"

"To prevent you beholding lying visions, my dear, or dreaming lyingdreams of what might very well have been but--God be thanked--never hasbeen--never was.--Think a minute--remember--look."

And once more Damaris felt the breath of high romance and touched dramaof rare quality, with those same two figures as protagonists, and thatsame Indian pleasure palace as their stage; but this time with a notabledifference of sentiment and of result.

For she visualized another going of Henrietta, a flight before the dawn.Saw, through a thick scent-drenched atmosphere, between the expiringlamp-light and broadening day, a deserted child beating its little hands,in the extremity of its impotent anguish, upon the pillows of adisordered unmade bed. Saw a man, too, worn and travel-stained from longriding throughout the night, lost to all decent dignities ofself-control, savage with the animalism of frustrated passion, rage toand fro amidst the litter of a smart woman's hurried packing, a trail ofpale blue ribbon plucking at and tripping him entangled in the rowels ofhis spurs.

All this she saw; and knew that her father--sitting on the cushionedwindow-seat beside her, his legs crossed, his chin sunk on hisbreast--saw it also. That he, indeed, voluntarily and of set purpose madeher see, transferring the living picture from his consciousness to herown. And, as she watched, each detail growing in poignancy andsignificance she--not all at once, but gropingly, rebelliously and onlyby degrees--comprehended that purpose, and the abounding love, both ofherself and of justice, which dictated it. Divining the root of hertrouble and the nature of her suspicion he took this strange means todissipate them. Setting aside his natural pride, he caused her to lookupon his hour of defeat and debasement, careless of himself if thereby hemight mend her hurt and win her peace of mind.

Damaris was conquered. Her stubbornness went down before his sacrifice.All the generosity in her leapt forth to meet and to acclaim the signalgenerosity in him--a generosity extended not only towards herself but toHenrietta Frayling as well. This last Damaris recognized as superb.--Hebade her remember. And, seeing in part through her own eyes, in partthrough his, she penetrated more deeply into his mind, into the richdiversity and, now mastered, violence of his character, than couldotherwise have been possible. She learnt him from within as well as fromwithout. He had been terrible--so she remembered--yet beautiful in hisfallen god-head. She had greatly feared him under that aspect. Later, shemore than ever loved him; and that with a provenant, protective and, babythough she was, a mothering love. He was beautiful now; but no longerterrible, no longer fallen--if not the god-head, yet the fine flower ofhis manhood royally and very sweetly disclosed. Her whole being yearnedtowards him; but humbly, a note of lowliness in her appreciation, astowards something exalted, far above her in experience, inself-knowledge and self-discipline.

She was, indeed, somewhat overwhelmed, both by realization of hisdistinction and of her own presumption in judging him, to the point ofbeing unable as yet to look him in the face. So she silently laid hold ofhis hand, drew it down from the window-ledge and round her waist.Slipping along the cushioned seat until she rested against him, she laidher head back upon his shoulder. Testimony in words seemed superfluousafter that shared consciousness, seemed impertinent even, an anti-climaxfrom which both taste and insight recoiled.

For a while Charles Verity let the silent communion continue. Then, lestit should grow enervating, to either or to both, he spoke of ordinarysubjects--of poor little General Frayling's illness, of Miss Felicia'splans, of his own book. It was wiser for her, better also for himself, tostep back into the normal thus quietly closing the door upon their dualact of retrospective clairvoyance.

Damaris, catching his intention, responded; and if rather languidly yetloyally played up. But, before the spell was wholly broken and franknessgave place to their habitual reserve, there was one further question shemust ask if the gnawings of that false conscience, begotten in her byHenrietta's strictures, were wholly to cease.

"Do you mind if we go back just a little minute," she said.

"Still unsatisfied, my dear?"

"Not unsatisfied--never again that as between us two, Commissioner Sahib.You have made everything beautifully, everlastingly smooth and clear."

"Because Henrietta tells me I have--have flirted--have played fast andloose with--with more than one person."

A pause, and the question came from above her--her head still lyingagainst his breast--with a trace of severity, or was it anxiety?

"And have you?"

"Not intentionally--not knowingly," Damaris said.

"If that is so, is it not sufficient?"

"No--because she implies that I have raised false hopes, and so entangledmyself--and that I ought to go further, that, as I understand her, Iought to be ready to marry--that it is not quite honourable to withdraw."

Charles Verity moved slightly, yet held her close. She felt the rise andfall of his ribs as he breathed slow and deep.

"Do you want to marry?" he at last asked her.

"No," she said, simply. "I'd much rather not, if I can keep out of itwithout acting unfairly by anyone--if you don't agree with Henrietta, anddon't think I need. You don't want me to marry do you?"

"God in heaven, no," Charles Verity answered. He put her from him, roseand moved about the room.

"To me, the thought of giving you in marriage to any man is little shortof abhorrent," he said hoarsely.

For fear clutched him by the throat. The gift of pearls, the little sceneof last night, and Damaris' emotion in bidding Carteret farewell,confronted him. The idea had never occurred to him before. Now it glaredat him, or rather he glared at it. It would be torment to say "yes"; andyet very difficult to say his best friend "nay." Anger kindled againstHenrietta Frayling. Must this be regarded as her handiwork? Yet he couldhardly credit it. Or had she some other candidate--Peregrine Ditton,young Harry Ellice?--But they were mere boys.--Of Marshall Wace he neverthought, the young man being altogether outside his field of vision inthis connection.

Long habit of personal chastity made Charles Verity turn, with a greaterstabbing and rending of repulsion, from the thought of marriage forDamaris. She asserted she had no wish to marry, that she--bless her sweetsimplicity!--would rather not. But this bare broaching of the subjectthrew him into so strange a tumult that, only too evidently, he was nocompetent observer, he laboured under too violent a prejudice. He had noright to demand from others the abstinence he chose himself to practise.Carteret, in desiring her, was within his rights. Damaris within hers,were she moved by his suit. Marriage is natural, wholesome, theGod-ordained law and sanction of human increase since man first drewbreath here upon earth. To condemn obedience to that law, by placing anyparental embargo upon Damaris' marriage, would be both a defiance ofnature and act of grossest selfishness.

He sat down on the window-seat again; and forced himself to put his armaround that fair maiden body, destined to be the prize, one day, of someman's love; the prey--for he disdained to mince matters, turning theknife in the wound rather--the prey of some man's lust. He schooledhimself, while Damaris' heart beat a little tempestuously under his hand,to invite a conclusion which through every nerve and fibre he loathed.

"My dear," he said, "I spoke unadvisedly with my lips just now, lettingcrude male jealousy get the mastery of reason and common sense. Put mywords out of your mind. They were unjustifiable, spoken in foolish heat.If you are in love with anyone"--

Damaris nestled against him.

"Only with you, dearest, I think," she said.

Charles Verity hesitated, unable to speak through the exquisite blow shedelivered and his swift thankfulness.

"Let us put the question differently then--translating it into thelanguage of ordinary social convention. Tell me, has anyoneproposed to you?"

Damaris, still nestling, shook her head.

"No--no one. And I hope now, no one will. I escaped that, partly thanksto my own denseness.--It is not an easy thing, Commissioner Sahib, toexplain or talk about. But I have come rather close to it lately,and"--with a hint of vehemence--"I don't like it. There is something init which pulls at me but not at the best part of me. So that I am dividedagainst myself. Though it does pull, I still want to push it all awaywith both hands. I don't understand myself and I don't understand it, Iwould rather be without it--forget it--if you think I am free to do so,if you are satisfied that I haven't intentionally hurt anyone orcontracted a--a kind of debt of honour?"

"I am altogether satisfied," he said. "Until the strange and ancientmalady attacks you in a very much more virulent form, you are free tocast Henrietta Frayling's insinuations to the winds, to ignore them andtheir existence."

BOOK IV

THROUGH SHADOWS TOWARDS THE DAWN

CHAPTER I

WHICH CARRIES OVER A TALE OF YEARS, AND CARRIES ON

The last sentence was written. His work finished. And, looking upon hiscompleted creation, Charles Verity saw that it was good. Yet, as he putthe pen back in the pen-tray and, laying the last page of manuscript facedownwards upon the blotting-paper passed his hand over it, he was lesssensible of exultation than of a pathetic emptiness. The book had come tobe so much part of him that he felt a nasty wrench when he thus finallyrid himself of it.

He had kept the personal pronoun out of it, strictly and austerely,desiring neither self-glorification nor self-advertisement. Yet his mindand attitude towards life seasoned and tempered the whole, giving itvitality and force. This was neither a "drum-and-trumpet history"designed to tickle the vulgar ear, nor a blank four-wall depository ofdry facts, names, dates, statistics, such as pedants mustily adore; but aliving thing, seen and felt. Not his subconscious, but that much finerand--as one trusts--more permanent element in our human constitution, hissuper-conscious self found expression in its pages and travelled freely,fruitfully, through them amid luminous and masterful ideas. At times theintellectual sweep threatened to be overdaring and overwide; so that, inthe interests of symmetry and balance of construction, he had been forcedto clip the wings of thought, lest they should bear him to regions tooremotely high and rare. Race, religion, customs and the modifications ofthese, both by climate and physical conformation of the land on the faceof which they operate, went to swell the interest and suggestion of histheme. In handling such varied and coloured material the intellectualexercise had been to him delicious, as he fashioned and put a fine edgeto passages of admirable prose, coined the just yet startling epithet,perfected the flow of some graceful period, and ransacked the Englishlanguage for fearless words in which to portray the mingled splendour andvileness of a barbaric oriental Court, the naked terrors of tribal feudsand internecine war.

The occupation had, indeed, proved at once so refreshing and so absorbingthat he went leisurely, lengthening out the process of production untilit came nearer covering the thirty months of elephantine gestation thanthe normal human nine.

With but two brief sojourns to England, for the consultation of certainauthorities and of his publishers, the said near on thirty months werepassed in wandering through Southern France, Central Italy, and, takingship from Naples to Malaga, finally through Eastern and Northern Spain.Charles Verity was too practised a campaigner for his power ofconcentration to depend on the stability or familiarity of hissurroundings. He could detach himself, go out into and be alone with hiswork, at will. But the last chapter, like the first, he elected to writein the study at The Hard. A pious offering of incense, this, to thepleasant memory of that excellent scholar and devoted amateur of letters,his great-uncle, Thomas Clarkson Verity, whose society and conversationawakened the literary sense in him as a schoolboy, on holiday fromHarchester, now nearly five decades ago. He judged it a matter of goodomen, moreover,--toying for the moment with kindly superstition--that thebook should issue from a house redeemed by his kinsman from base andbrutal uses and dedicated to the worship of knowledge and of the printedword. That fat, soft-bodied, mercurial-minded little gentleman--to whomno record of human endeavour, of human speculation, mental or moralexperiment, came amiss--would surely relish the compliment, if hiscurious and genial ghost still, in any sort, had cognizance of this, hisformer, dwelling-place.

The Hard, just now, showed a remarkably engaging countenance, the yearstanding on the threshold of May.--Mild softly bright weather made amendsfor a wet and windy April, with sunshine and high forget-me-not blueskies shading to silver along the sea-line. The flower-beds, before thegarden house-front, were crowded with early tulips, scarlet, golden, andshell-pink. Shrubberies glowed with rhododendrons, flamed with azaleas.At the corner of the battery and sea-wall, misty grey-green plumes oftamarisk veiled the tender background of grey-blue water and yellow-greysand. Birds peopled the scene. Gulls, in strong fierce flight, laughedoverhead. Swallows darted back and forth, ceaselessly twittering, as theybuilt their cup-shaped mud nests beneath the eaves. Upon the lawncompanies of starlings ran, flapping glossy wings, squealing, whistling;to the annoyance of a song thrush, in spotted waistcoat and neatlyfitting brown _surtout_, who, now tall, now flattened to the level of theturf, its head turned sideways, peered and listened, locating thepresence of the victim worm.--Three or four vigorous pecks--the starlingsrunning elsewhere--to loosen the surrounding soil, and the moist pinkliving string was steadily, mercilessly, drawn upward into theuncompromising light of day, to be devoured wriggling, bit by bit, withmost unlovely gusto.--The chaff-chaff sharpened his tiny saw tippingabout the branches of the fir trees in the Wilderness, along with thelinnets, tits, and gold-finches.

Such, out of doors, was the home world which received Damaris after thosemany months of continental travel, on the eve of her twenty-firstbirthday. To pass from the dynamic to the static mode must be alwayssomething of an embarrassment and trial, especially to the young withwhom sensation is almost disconcertingly direct and lively. Damarissuffered the change of conditions not without a measure or doubt andwonder. For they made demands to which she had become unaccustomed, andto which she found it difficult to submit quite naturally and simply. Awhole social and domestic order, bristling with petty obligations, closeddown upon her, within the bounds of which she felt to move awkwardly, atfirst, conscious of constraint.

Sympathetic Mrs. Cooper, comely and comfortable Mary, and the NapoleonicPatch, still reigned in house and stable. Laura had returned to herformer allegiance on the announcement of "the family's" arrival, andother underlings had been engaged by the upper servants in conclave. Tothese latter entered that Ulysses, Mr. Hordle, so rendering theestablishment once again complete.

The neighbours duly called--Dr. and Mrs. Horniblow, conscious of notablepreferment, since high ecclesiastical powers had seen fit to present theformer to a vacant canonry at Harchester. For three months yearly hewould in future be resident in the cathedral city. This would necessitatethe employment of a curate at Deadham, for the spiritual life of itsinhabitants must by no means suffer through its vicar's promotion. At themoment of Sir Charles and Damaris' return the curate excitement was atits height. It swept through the spinster-ranks of the congregation likean epidemic. They thrilled with unacknowledgeable hopes. The MissMinetts, though mature, grew pink and quivered, confessing themselves notaverse to offering board and lodging to a suitable, a well-connected,well-conducted paying guest. To outpourings on the enthralling subject ofthe curate, Damaris found herself condemned to listen from every femininevisitor in turn. It held the floor, to the exclusion of all other topics.Her own long absence, long journeys, let alone the affairs of the worldat large, were of no moment to these very local souls. So our young ladyretired within herself, deploring the existence of curates in general,and the projected, individual, Deadham curate in particular, with aheartiness she was destined later to remember. Had it beenprophetic?--Not impossibly so, granted the somewhat strange prescience bywhich she was, at times, possessed.

For the psychic quality that, from a child, now and again had manifesteditself in her--though happily unattended by morbid or hysterictendencies, thanks to her radiant health--grew with her growth. To her,in certain moods and under certain conditions, the barrier between thingsseen and unseen, material and transcendental, was pervious. It yieldedbefore the push of her apprehension, sense of what it guards, what itwithholds within an ace of breaking through.

Affairs of the heart would, so far, seem to have begun and ended with thewinter spent at St. Augustin. Now and again Damaris met an Englishman, orforeigner, who stirred her slightly. But if one accident of travelbrought them together, another accident of travel speedily swept themapart. The impression was fugitive, superficial, fading out and causingbut momentary regret. Colonel Carteret she only saw in London, duringthose two brief visits to England. He had been captivating, treating herwith playful indulgence, teasing a little; but far away, somehow--so shefelt him--though infinitely kind. And the dear man with the blueeyes--for she could use her old name for him again now, though shecouldn't quite tell why--looked older. The sentimental passage at St.Augustin assumed improbability--a fact over which she should, in allreason, have rejoiced, yet over which she, in point of fact when safefrom observation, just a little wept.

From Henrietta some few letters reached her. One of them contained thenews that Marshall Wace, surmounting his religious doubts andscruples--by precisely what process remained undeclared--had at lasttaken Holy Orders. Concerning this joyful consummation Henrietta waxedpositively unctuous. "He had gone through so much"--the old cry!--towhich now was added conviction that his own trials fitted him to ministerthe more successfully to his brethren among the sorely tried.

"His preaching will, I feel certain, be quite extraordinarily originaland sympathetic--full of poetry. And I need hardly tell you what animmense relief it is both to the General and to myself to feel he issettled in life, and that his future is provided for--though not,alas! in the way I fondly hoped, and which--for his happiness' sakeand my own--I should have chosen," she insidiously and even rathercynically wrote.

But, if in respect of the affections our maiden, during these two years,made no special progress and gained no further experimental knowledge ofthe perilous workings of sex, her advance in other departments was ample.

For faith now called to her with no uncertain note. The great spiritualforces laid hold of her intelligence and imagination, drawing, moulding,enlightening her. In the library of a somewhat grim hotel at Avila, inold Castile, she lighted upon an English translation of the life of St.Theresa--that woman of countless practical activities, seer and sybil,mystic and wit. The amazing biography set her within the magic circle ofChristian feminine beatitude; and opened before her gaze mightyperspectives of spiritual increase, leading upward through unnumberedranks of prophets, martyrs, saints, angelic powers, to the feet of theVirgin Mother, with the Divine Child on her arm.--He, this last, asgateway, intermediary, between the human soul and the mystery of GodAlmighty, by whom, and in whom, all things visible and invisible subsist.For the first time some dim and halting perception, some faintest hintand echo, reached Damaris of the awful majesty, the awful beauty of thefount of Universal Being; and, caught with a great trembling, sheworshipped.

This culminating perception, in terms of time, amounted to no more than asingle flash, the fraction of an instant's contact. An hour or so later,being very young and very human, the things of everyday resumed theirsway. A new dress engaged her fancy, a railway journey through--toher--untrodden country excited her, a picturesque street scene held herdelighted interest. Nevertheless that had taken place within her--call itconversion, evocation, the spiritual receiving of sight, as youplease--upon which, for those who have once experienced it, there is nogoing back while life and reason last. Obscured, overlaid, buried beneaththe dust of the trivial and immediate, the mark of revelation upon theforehead and the heart can never be obliterated quite. Its resurrectionis not only possible but certain, if not on the near side, then surely onthe farther side of death.

And not only did faith thus call her, at this period, but art, in itsmany forms, called her likewise. The two, indeed, according to herpresent understanding of them, moved--though at different levels--side byside, singularly conjoined, art translating faith into terms of sound,form and colour, faith consecrating and supplementing art. All of which,as she pondered, appeared to her only fitting and reasonable--the objectof art being to capture beauty and touch reality, the substance of faithbeing nothing less than beauty and reality absolute.

With Sir Charles sometimes, but more often with her aunt, MissFelicia--most enthusiastic, diligent and ingenuous of sightseers--shevisited buildings of historic interest, galleries of statuary and ofpictures. For here, too, in architecture, in marble god or hero, uponpainted panel or canvas, she caught, at moments, some flickering shadowof the everlasting light, touched at moments both by its abiding terrorand the ecstasy of its everlasting youth. But this appreciation of theheight and grandeur of man's endeavour was new in her. To Nature she hadfrom childhood, been curiously near. She sought expression andconfirmation of it with silent ardour, her mind aflame with the joy ofrecognition. And, as daily, hourly background to these her manyexperiments and excursions, was the stable interest of her father's book.For in the pages of that, too, she caught sight of beauty and reality ofno mean order, held nobly to ransom through the medium of words.

And while this high humour still possessed her, alive at every point,her thoughts--often by day, still oftener in dreams or wakefulintervals by night--rapt away beyond the stars, she was called upon, asalready noted, to pass abruptly from the dynamic to the static mode.Called on to embrace domestic duties, and meet local socialobligations, including polite endurance of long-drawn disquisitionsregarding Canon Horniblow's impending curate. The drop proveddisconcerting, or would have eminently done so had not anotherelement--disquieting yet very dear--come into play.

Meantime the change from the stimulating continental atmosphere to theparticularly soft and humid, not to say stagnant, English one, acted as adrop too. She drooped during the process of acclimatization. The fetidsweet reek off the mud-flats of the Haven oppressed and strangely pursuedher, so that she asked for the horses to take her to the freshness of thehigh lying inland moors, for a boat to carry her across the tide-river tothe less confined air and outlook of the Bar. Sight and sense of theblack wooden houses, upon the forbidden island, hanging like disreputableboon companions about the grey stone-built inn, oppressed and strangelypursued her too. She could see them from her bedroom between the redtrunks of the bird-haunted Scotch firs in the Wilderness. First thing, onclear mornings, the sunlight glittered on the glass of their smallwindows. Last thing, at night, the dim glow of lamp-light showed throughopen doorway, or flimsy curtain from within. They stood alone, butcuriously united and self-sufficing, upon the treeless inhospitable pieceof land, ringed by the rivers, the great whispering reed-beds and thetide. Their life was strangely apart from, defiant of, that of themainland and the village. It yielded obedience to traditions and customsof an earlier, wilder age; and in so much was sinister, a littlefrightening. Yet out of precisely this rather primitive and archaicenvironment came Darcy Faircloth, her half-brother, the human beingclosest to her by every tie of blood and sentiment in the world saveone--the father of them both. The situation was startling, alike in itsincongruities and in its claims.

During those two years of continental wandering--following upon hermeeting with him at Marseilles--the whole sweet and perplexing matter ofFaircloth had fallen more or less into line, taking on a measure ofsimplicity and of ease. She thought of him with freedom, wrote to himwhen he could advise her of his next port of call.--To him at Deadham, byhis request, he being very careful for her, she never wrote.--Andtherefore, all the more perhaps, being here at Deadham, his home and allthe suggestive accessories of it so constantly before her eyes, did herrelation to him suffer a painful transformation. In remembrance she hadcome to picture him on board his ship, governing his little floatingkingdom with no feeble or hesitating sway. But here every impeding factof class and education, every worldly obstacle to his and herintercourse, above all the hidden scandal of his birth sprang into highrelief. All the dividing, alienating influences of his antecedents, hissocial position and her own, swung in upon her with aggravated intensityand pathos.

Away, she felt sweetly secure of him. Sure his and her bond remainedinviolate. Sure his affection never wavered or paled, but stood always atthe flood, a constant quantity upon which she could draw at need; or--tochange the metaphor--a steady foundation upon which her heart couldsafely build. He would not, could not, ever fail her. This had beensufficient to stay her longing for sight and speech of him, her longingfor his bodily presence. But now, in face of the very concrete facts ofthe island, the inn, which bore his name and where his mother lived andruled, of the property he owned, the place and people to which--by halfat least of his nature and much more than half his memory--he belonged,the comfort of this spiritual esoteric relation became but a meagreevasive thing. It was too unsubstantial. Doubts and fears encircled it.She grew heart-sick for some fresh testimony, some clear immediateassurance that time and absence had not staled or undermined the romance.

If only she could speak of it! But that was forbidden by every obligationof filial piety. Never had her relation to her father been more tender,more happy; yet only through sudden pressure of outward circumstancecould she speak to him of Faircloth. To do so, without serious necessity,would be, as she saw it, a wanton endangering of his peace.--If only thedear man with the blue eyes hadn't removed himself! She had counted uponhis permanent support and counsel, on his smoothing away difficultiesfrom the path of her dealings with Faircloth; but he appeared to havegiven her altogether the go-by, to have passed altogether out of herorbit. And meditating, in the softly bright May weather beneath thosehigh forget-me-not blue skies, upon his defection, our maiden felt quitedesperately experienced and grown up, thrown back upon her own resources,thrown in upon her rather solitary life.

Throughout the summer visitors came and went; but never those two desiredfigures, Faircloth or Carteret. Dr. McCabe, vociferous in welcome,affectionate, whimsical and choleric, trundled over from Stourmouth on abicycle of phenomenal height.

"On the horse without wheels I'm proficient enough," he declared. "Knowthe anatomy of the darlin' beast as well as I do my own, inside and out.But, be dashed, if the wheels without the horse aren't beyond me quite.Lord love you, but the skittish animal's given me some ugly knocks, castme away, it has, in the wayside ditch, covering me soul with burningshame, and me jacket with malodorous mud."

At intervals Aunt Harriet Cowden and Uncle Augustus drove over in statethe twelve miles from Paulton Lacy--the lady faithful to garments dyed,according to young Tom Verity, in the horrid hues of violet ink. Sheexpressed her opinions with ruthless frankness, criticized, domineered,put all and sundry in--what she deemed--"their place"; and departed forthe big house on the confines of Arnewood Forest again, to, had she butknown it, a chorus of sighings of relief from those she left behind herand on whose emotional and intellectual tastes and toes she somercilessly trod.

Garden parties, tennis tournaments, the Napworth cricket week, claimedDamaris' attendance in turn, along with agreeable display of her foreignspoils in the matter of Paris hats and frocks. Proofs arrived in bigenvelopes perpetually by post; first in the long, wide-margined galleyform, later in the more dignified one of quire and numbered page. Thecrude, sour smell of damp paper and fresh printer's ink, for the firsttime assailed our maiden's nostrils. It wasn't nice; yet she sniffed itwith a quaint sense of pleasure. For was it not part of the wholewonderful, beautiful business of the making of books? To the artist themeanest materials of his art have a sacredness not to be denied orignored. They go to forward the birth of the precious whole, and henceare redeemed, for him, from all charge of common or uncleanness.

Finally Miss Felicia, arriving in mid-June, paid an unending visit, ofwhich Damaris felt no impatience. Miss Felicia during the last two yearshad, indeed, become a habit. The major affairs of life it might be bothuseless and unwise to submit to her judgment. She lost her way in them,fluttering ineffectual, gently hurried and bird-like. But, in life'sminor affairs, her innocent enthusiasm was invaluable as an encouragingasset. It lent point and interest to happenings and occupations otherwisetrivial or monotonous. If silly at times, she never wasstupid--distinction of meaning and moment.--A blameless creature,incapable of thinking, still more of speaking, evil of the worst orweakest, her inherent goodness washed about you like sun-warmed water, ifsterile yet translucently pure.

And so the months accumulated. The clear colours of spring ripened to thehotter gamut of mid-summer, to an August splendour of ripening harvest infield, orchard and hedgerow, and thence to the purple, russet and gold ofautumn. The birds, their nesting finished, ceased from song, as theactive care of hungry fledglings grew on them. The swallows had gatheredfor their southern flight, and the water-fowl returned from theirnorthern immigration to the waters and reed-beds of the Haven, SirCharles Verity's book, in two handsome quarto volumes, had been dulyreviewed and found a place of honour in every library, worth the name, inthe United Kingdom, before anything of serious importance occurreddirectly affecting our maiden. Throughout spring, summer and the firstweeks of autumn, she marked time merely. Her activities and emotions--inas far, that is, as outward expression of these last went--werevicarious, those of others. She glowed over and gloried in the triumph ofher father's book, it is true, but it was his adventure, after all,rather than her own.

Then suddenly, as is the way with life, events crowded on oneanother, the drama thickened, sensation was tuned to a higher pitch.And it all began, not unludicrously, through the praiseworthy, ifrather ill-timed moral indignation of Canon Horniblow's newlyinstalled curate, Reginald Sawyer.

CHAPTER II

RECALLING, IN SOME PARTICULARS, THE EASIEST RECORDED THEFT INHUMAN HISTORY

He was short, neat, spectacled, in manner prompt and perky, in age underthirty, a townsman by birth and education, hailing from Midlandshire.Further, a strong advocate of organization, and imbued with the deepestrespect for the obligations and prerogatives of his profession upon theethical side. He took himself very seriously; and so took, also, thedecalogue as delivered to mankind amid the thunders of Sinai. Keep theTen Commandments, according to the letter, and you may confidently expectall things, spiritual and temporal, to be added unto you--such was thebasis of his teaching and of his private creed.

He came to Deadham ardent for the reformation of that remote, benightedspot, so disgracefully, as he feared--and rather hoped--behind the times.He suspected its canon-vicar of being very much too easy-going; and itspopulation, in respect of moral conduct, of being lamentably lax. Inneither of which suppositions, it must be admitted, was he altogetherincorrect. But he intended to alter all that!--Regarding himself thus, inthe light of a providentially selected new broom, he applied himselfdiligently to sweep. A high-minded and earnest, if not conspicuouslywell-bred young man, he might in a suburban parish have done excellentwork. But upon Deadham, with its enervating, amorous climate and queerinheritance of forest and seafaring--in other words poaching andsmuggling--blood, he was wasted, out of his element and out of touch. Theslow moving South Saxon cocked a shrewd sceptical eye at him, sized himup and down and sucked in its cheek refusing to be impressed. While byuntoward accident, his misfortune rather than his fault, the earliest ofhis moral sweepings brought him into collision with the most reactionaryelement in the community, namely the inhabitants of the black cottagesupon the Island.

The event fell out thus. The days shortened, the evenings lengthenedgrowing misty and secret as October advanced. The roads became plashy andrutted, the sides of them silent with fallen leaves under foot. An oddsense of excitement flickers through such autumn twilights. Boys herdedin little troops on wickedness intent. Whooping and whistling to disarmtheir elders' suspicion until the evil deed should be fairly withinreach, then mum as mice, stealthily vanishing, becoming part and parcelof the earth, the hedge, the harsh dusky grasses of the sand-hills, theforeshore lumber on the beach.

Late one afternoon, the hour of a hidden sunset, Reginald Sawyer calledat The Hard; and to his eminent satisfaction--for social aspirations wereby no means foreign to him--was invited to remain to tea. Theladies--Damaris and Miss Felicia--were kind, the cakes and creamsuperlative. He left in high feather; and, at Damaris' suggestion, took ashort cut through the Wilderness and by a path crossing the warren to thelane, leading up from the causeway, which joins the high-road justopposite the post office and Mrs. Doubleday's shop. By following thisroute he would save quite half a mile on his homeward journey; since theGrey House, where he enjoyed the Miss Minetts' assiduous and genteelhospitality, is situate at the extreme end of Deadham village on the roadto Lampit.

Out on the warren, notwithstanding the hour and the mist, it was stillfairly light, the zigzagging sandy path plainly visible between theheath, furze brakes, stunted firs and thorn bushes. The young clergyman,although more familiar with crowded pavements and flare of gas-lamps thanopen moorland in the deepening dusk, pursued his way without difficulty.What a wild region it was though! He thought of the sober luxury of thelibrary at The Hard, the warmth, the shaded lights, the wealth of books;of the grace of Damaris' clothing and her person, and wondered howpeople of position and education could be content to live in so out ofthe way and savage a spot. It was melancholy to a degree, in hisopinion.--Oh! well, he must do his best to wake it up, infuse a spirit ofprogress into it more in keeping with nineteenth-century ideas. Everyonewould be grateful to him--

A little questioning pause--assurance in momentary eclipse. Then withrenewed cheerfulness--Of course they would--the upper classes, that is.For they must feel the disadvantages of living in such a back-water. Hegave them credit for the wish to advance could they but find the way.All they needed was leadership, which Canon Horniblow--evidently pasthis work--was powerless to supply. He, Sawyer, came as a pioneer. Oncethey grasped that fact they would rally to him. The good Miss Minettswere rallying hard, so to speak, already. Oh! there was excellentmaterial in Deadham among the gentlefolk. It merely needed working,needed bringing out.

From the lower, the wage-earning class, sunk as it was in ignorance, hemust, he supposed, expect but a poor response, opposition not impossibly.Opposition would not daunt him. You must be prepared to do people good,if not with, then against their will. He was here to make them rebelagainst and shake off the remnants of the Dark Ages amid which they soextraordinarily appeared still to live. He had no conception so low astate of civilization could exist within little over a hundred miles ofthe metropolis!--It was a man's work, anyhow, and he must put his backinto it. Must organize--word of power--organize night classes, lectureswith lantern slides, social evenings, a lads' club. Above all was thereroom and necessity for this last. The Deadham lads were very rowdy, veryunruly. They gathered at corners in an objectionable manner; hung aboutthe public-house. He must undersell the public-house by offering counterattractions. Amongst the men he suspected a sad amount of drinking. Theirspeech, too, was so reprehensibly coarse. He had heard horrible languagein the village street. He reproved the offenders openly, as was his duty,and his admonitions were greeted with a laugh, an insolent, offensive,jeering laugh.

Sawyer cut at the dark straggling furzes bordering the path with hiswalking-stick. Recollection of that laugh made him go red about the ears;made his skin tingle and his eyes smart. It represented an insult notonly to himself but to his cloth. Yet he'd not lost control of himself,he was glad to remember, though the provocation was rank--

He cut at the furze again, being by nature combative. And--stopped short,with a start, a tremor running through him. Something rustled, scuttledaway amongst the bushes, and something flapped upward behind him into thethick lowering sky above. A wailing cry--whether human, or of bird orbeast, he was uncomfortably ignorant--came out of the mist ahead, to beanswered by a like and nearer cry from a spot which he failed, in hisagitation, to locate.

Under ordinary conditions the young cleric was neither troubled byimagination nor lacking in pluck. His habitual outlook was sensible,literal and direct. But, it must be owned, this wide indistinctlandscape, over which pale vapours trailed and brooded, the immenseloneliness of the felt rather than seen, expanse of water, marsh andmud-flat of the Haven--the tide being low--along with the goblinwhispering chuckle of the river speeding seaward away there on his left,made him oddly jumpy and nervous. No human being was in sight, neitherdid any human dwelling show signs of habitation. He wished he had goneround by the road and through the length of the village. He registered avow against short cuts--save in broad daylight--for his presentsurroundings inspired him with the liveliest distrust. They were to himpositively nightmarish. He suffered the nastiest little fears of whatmight follow him, what might, even now, peer and lurk. Heretofore he hadconsidered the earth as so much dead matter, to be usefully andprofitably exploited by all-dominant man--specially by men of his owncreed and race. But now the power of the earth laid hands on him. Shelived, and mankind dwindled to the proportions of parasitic insects, atmost irritating some small portions of her skin, her vast indifferentsurface. Such ideas had never occurred to him before. He resentedthem--essayed to put them from him as trenching on blasphemy.

Starting on again, angry alike with himself for entertaining, and withthe unknown for engendering, such subversive notions, his paceunconsciously quickened to a run. But the line of some half-dozen raggedScotch firs, which here topped the low cliff bordering the river, to hisdisordered vision seemed most uncomfortably to run alongside him,stretching gaunt arms through the encircling mist to arrest his flight.

He regarded them with an emotion of the liveliest antipathy; consciouslylonging, meanwhile, for the humming thoroughfares of his nativeindustrial town, for the rattle and grind of the horse-trams, thebrightly lighted shop-fronts, the push all about him of human labour, ofbooming trade and vociferous politics. Even the glare of a gin palace,flooding out across the crowded pavement at some street corner, wouldhave, just now, been fraught with solace, convinced prohibitionist thoughhe was. For he would, at least, have been in no doubt how to feel towardsthat stronghold of Satan--righteously thanking God he was not as thosereprehensible others, who passed in and out of its ever-swinging doors.While towards this earth dominance, this dwarfing of human life by thelife of things he had hitherto called inanimate, he did not know how tofeel at all. It attacked some unarmoured, unprotected part of him.Against its assault he was defenceless.

With a sense of escape from actual danger, whether physical or moral hedid not stay to enquire, he stumbled, a few minutes later, through a gapin the earth-bank into the wet side lane. Arrived, he gave himself amoment's breathing space. It was darker here than out upon the warren;but, anyhow, this was a lane. It had direction and meaning. Men hadconstructed it for the linking up of house with house, hamlet withhamlet. Like all roads, it represented the initial instinct of communallife, the basis of a reasoned social order, of civilization in short.He walked forward over the soft couch of fallen, water-soaked leaves,his boots squelching at times into inches of sucking mud, and hisspirits rose. He began to enter into normal relations both with himselfand with things in general. A hundred yards or so and the village greenwould be reached.

Then on his left, behind an ill-kept quick-set hedge that guarded a stripof garden and orchard, he became aware of movement. Among the apple treesthree small figures shuffled about some dark recumbent object. For themost part they went on all fours, but at moments reared up on their hindlegs. Their action was at once silent, stealthy and purposeful. Our youngclergyman's shortness of sight rendered their appearance the morepeculiar. His normal attitude was not so completely restored, moreover,but that they caused him another nervous tremor. Then he grasped thetruth; while the detective, latent in every moralist, sprang toattention. Here were criminals to be brought to justice, criminals caughtred-handed. Reginald Sawyer, having been rather badly scared himself,lusted--though honestly ignorant of any personal touch in the matter--tovery badly scare others.

Standing back beside the half-open gate, screened by the hedge, here highand straggling, he awaited the psychological moment, ready to pounce. Toenter the orchard and confront these sinners with their crime, if theiractivities did by chance happen to be legitimate, was to put himselfaltogether in the wrong. He would bide his time, would let them concludetheir--in his belief--nefarious business and challenge them as theypassed out.

Nor had he long to wait. The two smaller boys, breathing hard, hoistedthe bulging, half-filled sack on to the back of their biggercompanion; who, bowed beneath its weight, grunting with exertion,advanced towards the exit.

Sawyer laid aside his walking-stick, and, as the leader of the processioncame abreast of him, pounced. But missed his aim. Upon which the boy castdown the sack, from the mouth of which apples, beets, turnips rolled intothe road; and, with a yelp, bolted down the lane towards the causeway,leaving his accomplices to their fate. These, thrown into confusion bythe suddenness of his desertion, hesitated and were lost. For, pouncingagain, and that the more warily for his recent failure, Sawyer collaredone with either hand.

They were maladorous children; and the young clergyman, grasping woollenjersey-neck and shirt-band, the backs of his hands in contact with thebacks of their moist, warm, dirty little necks, suffered disgust, yetheld them the more firmly.

"I am convinced you have no right to that fruit or to those vegetables.You are stealing. Give an account of yourselves at once."

And he shook them slightly to emphasize his command. One hung on hishand, limp as a rag. The other showed fight, kicking our friend liberallyabout the shins, with hobnailed boots which did, most confoundly, hurt.

"You lem' me go," he cried. "Lem' me go, or I'll tell father, and firsttime you come along by our place 'e'll set the ratting dawgs on to you.Our ole bitch 'as got 'er teeth yet. She'll bite. Ketch the fleshy partof your leg, she will, and just tear and bite."

This carrying of war into the enemy's country proved as disconcerting asunexpected, while to mention the sex of an animal was, in ReginaldSawyer's opinion, to be guilty of unpardonable coarseness. The atmosphereof a Protestant middle-class home clung to him yet, begetting in him asqueamishness, not to say prudery, almost worthy of his hostesses, theMiss Minetts. He shook the culprits again, with a will. He also blushed.

"If you were honest you would be anxious to give an account ofyourselves," he asserted, ignoring the unpleasant matter of the dogs. "Iam afraid you are very wicked boys. You have stolen these vegetables andfruits. Thieves are tried by the magistrates, you know, and sent toprison. I shall take you to the police-station. There the constable willfind means to make you confess."

Beyond provoking a fresh paroxysm of kicking, these adjurations werewithout result. His captives appeared equally impervious to shame,contrition or alarm. They remained obstinately mute. Whereupon it beganto dawn upon their captor that his position risked becoming not a littleinvidious, since the practical difficulty of carrying his threats intoexecution was so great. How could he haul two sturdy, active children,plus a sack still containing a goodly quantity of garden produce, somequarter of a mile without help? To let them go, on the other hand, wasto have them incontinently vanish into those trailing whitish vapourscreeping over the face of the landscape. And, once vanished, they werelost to him, since he knew neither their names nor dwelling place; andcould, with no certainty, identify them, having seen them only in theact of struggle and in this uncertain evening light. He felt himselfvery nastily planted on the horns of a dilemma, when on a sudden therearrived help.

A vehicle of some description turned out of the main road and headeddown the lane.

Laocooen-like, flanked on either hand by a writhing youthful figure,Reginald Sawyer called aloud:

"Hi!--Stop, there--pray, stop."

Darcy Faircloth lighted down out of a ramshackle Marychurch station fly,and advanced towards the rather incomprehensible group.

"What's happened? What's the matter?" he said. "What on earth do you wantwith those two youngsters?"

"I want to convey them to the proper authorities," Sawyer answered, withall the self-importance he could muster. He found his interlocutor'ssomewhat abrupt and lordly manner at once annoying and impressive, aswere his commanding height and rather ruffling gait. "These boys havebeen engaged in robbing a garden. I caught them in the act, and it is myduty to see that they pay the penalty of their breach of the law. I counton your assistance in taking them to the police-station."

"You want to give them in charge?"

"What else?--The moral tone of this parish is, I grieve to say,very low."

Sawyer talked loud and fast in the effort to assert himself.

"Low and coarse," he repeated. "Both as a warning to others, and inthe interests of their own future, an example must be made of thesetwo lads."

The little boys, who had remained curiously and rather dangerously stillsince the advent of this stranger, now strained together, signalling,whispering. Sawyer shook them impatiently apart.

"Steady there, please," Faircloth put in sharply. "It strikes me you takea good deal upon yourself. May I ask who you are?"

"I am the assistant priest," Reginald began. But his explanation was cutshort by piping voices.

"It's Cap'en Darcy, that's who it is. We never meant no 'arm, Cap'en.That we didn't. The apples was rotting on the ground, s'h'lp me if theywasn't. Grannie Staples was took to the Union last Wednesday fortnight,and anyone's got the run of her garden since. Don't you let the newparson get us put away, Cap'en. We belongs to the Island--I'm WilliamJennifer's Tommy, please Cap'en, and 'e's Bobby Sclanders 'e is."

And being cunning, alike by nature and stress of circumstance, theypathetically drooped, blubbering in chorus:

"We never didn't mean no 'arm, Cap'en. Strike me dead if we did."

At which last implied profanity Reginald Sawyer shuddered, looseninghis grasp.

Of what followed he could subsequently give no definite account. Thedignities of his sacred profession and his self-respect alike reeledignominiously into chaos. He believed he heard the person, addressed asCaptain Darcy, say quietly:

"Cut it, youngsters. Now's your chance."

He felt that both the children violently struggled, and that the roundhard head of one of them butted him in the stomach. He divined thatsounds of ribald laughter, in the distance, proceeded from the driverof the Marychurch station fly. He knew two small figures raced whoopingdown the lane attended by squelchings of mud and clatter of heavysoled boots.

Knew, further, that Captain Darcy, after nonchalantly picking up thesack, dropping it within the garden hedge and closing the rickety gate,stood opposite him and quite civilly said:

"I am sorry I could not give you the sort of assistance, sir, which youasked. But the plan would not have worked."

Sawyer boiled over.

"You have compounded a felony and done all that lay in your power toundermine my authority with my parishioners. Fortunately I retain theboys' names and can make further enquiries. This, however, by no meansrelieves you of the charge of having behaved with reprehensible levityboth towards my office and myself."

"No--no," Faircloth returned, goodnaturedly. "Sleep upon it, and you willtake an easier view of the transaction. I have saved you from puttingunmerited disgrace upon two decent families and getting yourself into hotwater up to the neck. I know these Deadham folk better than you do. I'mone of them, you see, myself. They've uncommonly long memories wherethey're offended, though it may suit them to speak you soft. Take it fromme, you'll never hound them into righteousness. They turn as stubborn asso many mules under the whip."

He hailed the waiting flyman.

"Good evening to you, sir," he said. And followed by the carriage, piledwith sea-chest and miscellaneous baggage, departed into themysteriousness of deepening dusk.

Had the young clergyman been willing to leave it at that, all might yethave been well, his ministry at Deadham a prolonged and fruitful one,since his intentions, at least, were excellent. But, as ill-luck wouldhave it, while still heated and sore, every feather on end, his naturalcombativeness almost passionately on top, turning out in the high-road heencountered Dr. Cripps, faring westward like himself on the way to visita patient at Lampit. The two joined company, falling into a conversationthe more confidential that the increasing darkness gave them a sense ofisolation and consequent intimacy.

Of all his neighbours, the doctor--a peppery disappointed man, strugglingwith a wide-strewn country practice mainly prolific of bad debts,conscious of his own inefficiency and perpetually smarting under imaginedinjuries and slights--was the very last person to exercise a mollifyinginfluence upon Sawyer in his existing angry humour. The latter recountedand enlarged upon the insults he had just now suffered. His hearer fannedthe flame of indignation with comment and innuendo--recognized Fairclothfrom the description, and proceeded to wash his hands in scandalousinsinuation at the young sea-captain's expense.

For example, had not an eye to business dictated the sheltering fromjustice of those infant, apple-stealing reprobates? Their respectivefathers were good customers! The islanders all had the reputation of harddrinkers--and an innkeeper hardly invites occasion to lower his receipts.The inn stood in old Mrs. Faircloth's name, it is true; but the sonprofited, at all events vicariously, by its prosperity. A swaggeringfellow, with an inordinate opinion of his own ability and merits; but inthat he shared a family failing. For arrogance and assumption the wholeclan was difficult to beat.

"You have heard whose son this young Faircloth is, of course?"

Startled by the question, and its peculiar implication, Reginald Sawyerhesitatingly admitted his ignorance.

The Grey House stands flush with the road, and the two gentlemen finishedtheir conversation upon the doorstep. Above them a welcoming glow shonethrough the fanlight; otherwise its windows were shuttered and blank.

"This is a matter of common knowledge," Dr. Cripps said; "but one aboutwhich, for reasons of policy, or, more truly, of snobbery, it is thefashion to keep silent. So, for goodness' sake, don't give me as yourauthority if you should ever have occasion to speak of it"--

And lowering his voice he mentioned a name.

"As like as two peas," he added, "when you see them side by side--which,in point of fact, you never do. Oh! I promise you the whole dirtybusiness has been remarkably well engineered--hush-money, I suppose.Sometimes I am tempted to think poverty is the only punishable sin inthis world. For those who have a good balance at their bankers there isalways a safe way out of even the most disgraceful imbroglios of thissort. But I must be moving on, Mr. Sawyer. I sympathize with yourannoyance. You have been very offensively treated. Good night."

The young clergyman remained planted on the doorstep, incapable ofringing the bell and presenting himself to his assiduously attentivehostesses, the Miss Minetts, for the moment.

He was, in truth, indescribably shocked. Deadham presented itself tohis mind as a place accursed, a veritable sink of iniquity. High andlow alike, its inhabitants were under condemnation.--And he had soenjoyed his tea with the ladies at The Hard. Had been so flattered bytheir civility, spreading himself in the handsome room, agreeablysensible of its books, pictures, ornaments, and air of culturedleisure.--While behind all that, as he now learned, was this glaringmoral delinquency! Never had he been more cruelly deceived. He feltsick with disgust. What callousness, what hypocrisy!--He recalled hisdisquieting sensations in crossing the warren. Was the very soil ofthis place tainted, exhaling evil?

He made a return upon himself. For what, after all, was he here for saveto let in light and combat evil, to bring home the sense of sin to theinhabitants of this place, convincing them of the hatefulness of themoral slough in which they so revoltingly wallowed. He must slay andspare not. He saw himself as David, squaring up to Goliath, as Christianfighting single-handed against the emissaries of Satan who essayed todefeat his pilgrimage. Yes, he would smite these lawbreakers hip andthigh, whatever their superficial claims to his respect, whatever theirworldly position. He would read them all a lesson--that King Log, CanonHorniblow, included.

He at once pitied and admired himself, not being a close critic ofhis own motives; telling himself he did well to be angry, whileignoring the element of personal pique which gave point andsatisfaction to that anger.

He was silent and reserved with the Miss Minetts at supper; and retiredearly to his own room to prepare a sermon.

CHAPTER III

BROTHER AND SISTER

Upon the Sunday morning following, Damaris went to the eleven o'clockservice alone. Miss Felicia Verity attended church at an earlier hourto-day, partly in the interests of private devotion, partly in those of aperson she had warmly befriended in the past, and wanted to befriend inthe present--but with delicacy, with tact and due consideration for thesusceptibilities of others. She wished earnestly to effect areconciliation; but not to force it. To force it was to endanger itssincerity and permanence. It should seem to come about lightly,naturally. Therefore did she go out early to perfect her plans--of whichmore hereafter--as well as to perform her religious duties. Sir CharlesVerity was from home, staying with Colonel Carteret for partridgeshooting, over the Norfolk stubble-fields. The habit of this annual visithad, for the last two seasons, been in abeyance; but now, with his returnto The Hard, was pleasantly revived, although this autumn, owing tobusiness connected with the publication of his book, the visit took placea few weeks later than usual.

Hence did Damaris--arrayed in a russet-red serge gown, black velvetcollar and cuffs to its jacket of somewhat manly cut, and a russet-redupstanding plume in her close-fitting black velvet hat--set forth aloneto church. This, after redirecting such letters as had arrived for herfather by the morning post. One of them bore the embossed arms of theIndia Office, and signature of the, then, Secretary of State for thatdepartment in the corner of the envelope. She looked at it with a measureof respect and curiosity, wondering as to the purport of its contents.She studied the envelope, turning it about in the hope of gleaningenlightenment from its external aspect. Still wondering, slightlyoppressed even by a persuasion--of which she could not rid herself--thatit held matters of no common moment closely affecting her father, shewent out of the house, down the sheltered drive, and through the entrancegates. Here, as she turned inland, the verve of the clear autumn morningrushed on her, along with a wild flurry of falling leaves dancing to thebreath of the crisp northerly breeze.

A couple of fine days, with a hint of frost in the valley by night, aftera spell of soft mists and wet, sent the leaves down in flutteringmultitudes, so that now all trees, save the oaks only, were bare.These--by which the road is, just here, overhung--still solidly clothedin copper, amber and--matching our maiden's gown--in russet-red, offeredsturdy defiance to the weather. The sound of them, a dry crowdedrustling, had a certain note of courage and faithfulness in it whichcaused Damaris to wait awhile and listen; yet a wistfulness also, sinceto her hearing a shudder stirred beneath its bravery, preluding thecoming rigours of winter.

And that wistfulness rather strangely enlarged its meaning and area, asthe reiterated ting, tang, tong of Deadham's church bells recalled theobject of her walk. For English church services, of the parochial varietysuch as awaited her, had but little, she feared, to give. Little, thatis, towards the re-living of those instants of exalted spiritualperception which had been granted to her at distant Avila.

In overstrained and puritanic dread of idolatory, the English Church hasgone lamentably far to forfeit its sacramental birthright. It savours toostrongly of the school and class-room, basing its appeal upon words, uponspoken expositions, instructive no doubt, but cold, academic. It offersno tangible object of worship to sight or sense. Its so-called altars areempty. Upon them no sacrifice is offered, no presence abidingly dwells.In its teaching the communion of saints and forgiveness of sins arephrases rather than living agencies. Its atmosphere is self-conscious,its would-be solemnity forced.--This, in any case, was how Damaris sawthe whole matter--though, let us hasten to add, she was modest enough toquestion whether the fault might not very well be in herself rather thanin our national variant of the Christian Faith. Many sweet, goodpersons--dear Aunt Felicia among them--appeared to find Anglicanministrations altogether sufficient for their religious needs. But toDamaris those ministrations failed to bring any moment of vision, ofcomplete detachment. She must be to blame, she supposed--which wasdiscouraging, a little outcasting and consequently sad.

In a somewhat pensive spirit she therefore, pursued her way, until, wherethe prospect widened as she reached the village green, a larger skydisclosed itself flaked with light cirrus cloud. This glory of space, andthe daring northerly breeze blowing out from it, sent her fancy flying.It beckoned to journeyings, to far coasts and unknown seas--an offshorewind, filling the sails of convoys outward bound. And, with the thoughtof ships upon the sea, came the thought of Darcy Faircloth, and that withsharp revolt against the many existing hindrances to his and herintercourse. Freedom seemed abroad this morning. Even the leaves declaredfor liberty, courting individual adventure upon the wings of that daringwind. And this sense of surrounding activity worked upon Damaris, makingher doubly impatient of denials and arbitrary restraints. She sent hersoul after Darcy Faircloth across the waste of waters, fondly, almostfiercely seeking him. But her soul refused to travel, curiously turninghomeward again, as though aware not the prodigious fields of ocean, norany loud-voiced foreign port of call, held knowledge of him, but ratherthe immediate scene, the silver-glinting levels of the Haven and lonelystone-built inn.

Deadham church, originally a chapelry of Marychurch Abbey, crowns a greenmonticule in the centre of Deadham village, backed by a row of bigelms.--A wide, low-roofed structure, patched throughout the course ofcenturies beyond all unity and precision of design; yet still showingtraces of Norman work in the arch of the belfry and in the pillarssupporting the rafters of the middle aisle. At the instance of a formervicar, the whole interior received a thick coat of whitewash, alike overplaster and stone. This, at the time in question, had been in placesscraped off, bringing to light some mural paintings of considerableinterest and antiquity.

In the chancel, upon the gospel side, is a finely-carved tomb, withrecumbent figures of an armoured knight and richly-robed lady, whoseslippered feet push against the effigy of a particularly alert,sharp-muzzled little hound. The two front pews, in the body of thechurch, at the foot of the said tomb, are allotted to the owner andhousehold at The Hard. The slender, lively little hound and the twosculptured figures lying, peaceful in death, for ever side by side,touched and captivated Damaris from the first time she set eyes on them.She reverenced and loved them, weaving endless stories about them when,in the tedium of prayer or over-lengthy sermon, her attention, all toooften, strayed.

This morning the three bells jangled altogether as she reached thechurchyard gate. Then the smallest tolled alone, hurrying stragglers. Shewas indeed late, the bulk of the congregation already seated, the Canonat the reading-desk and Mrs. Horniblow wheezing forth a voluntary uponthe harmonium, when she walked up the aisle.

But, during her brief passage, Damaris could not but observe thelargeness of the assembly. An uncommon wave of piety must have swept overthe parish this morning! The Battyes and Taylors were present in force.Farmers and tradespeople mustered in impressive array. Even Dr.Cripps--by no means a frequent churchgoer--and his forlorn-looking,red-eyed little wife were there. The Miss Minetts had a lady with them--aplump, short little person, dressed with attempted fashion, whose backstruck Damaris as quaintly familiar, she catching a glimpse of it inpassing. Most surprising of all, William Jennifer headed a contingentfrom the Island, crowding the men's free seats to right and left of thewest door. An expectancy, moreover, seemed to animate the throng. Thenshe remembered, the new curate, Reginald Sawyer, had informed her andMiss Felicia two evenings ago when he had called and been bidden to stayto tea, that he would preach for the first time at the eleven o'clockservice. So far he had only occupied the pulpit on Sunday afternoons,when a country congregation is liable to be both scanty and somnolent.To-day he would prove himself before the heads of tribes, before thenotables. And Damaris wished him well, esteeming him a worthy young man,if somewhat provincial and superfluously pompous.

In the servants' pew directly behind, Mary and Mrs. Cooper were dulyensconced, supported by Mr. Patch, two small male Patches, white-collaredand shining with excess of cleanliness, wedged in between him and hisstable sub-ordinate Conyers, the groom. The Hard thus made a commendablyrespectable show, as Damaris reflected with satisfaction.

She stood, she knelt, her prayer book open upon the carved margin of thetomb, the slender crossed legs and paws of the alert little marble dogserving as so often before for bookrest. Canon Horniblow boomed anddroned, like some unctuous giant bumble-bee, from the reading-desk. Thechoir intoned responses from the gallery with liberal diversity of pitch.And presently, alas! Damaris' thoughts began to wander, making flittingexcursions right and left. For half-way through the litany some belatedworshipper arrived, causing movement in the men's free seats. This oddlydisturbed her. Her mind flew again to Faircloth, and the strangeimpression of her own soul's return declaring this and no other to be hisactual neighbourhood. And if it indeed were so?--Damaris thrust back theemotions begotten of that question, as unpermissibly stormy at this timeand in this place.

She tried to fix her thoughts wholly upon the office. But, all too soonthey sprang aside again, now circling about the enigmatic back beheld inthe Miss Minetts' pew. Of whom did that round, dressy little form remindher? Why--why--of Theresa, of course. Not Theresa, genius and saint ofSpanish Avila; but Theresa Bilson, her sometime governess-companion ofdoubtfully amiable memory. She longed to satisfy herself, but could onlydo so by turning round and looking squarely--a manoeuvre impossibleduring the prayers, but which might be accomplished later, when thecongregation rose to sing the hymn before the sermon.

She must wait. And during that waiting light, rather divertingly, brokein on her. For supposing her belief as to the lady's identity correct,must not dear Aunt Felicia be party to this resurrection? Had not sheknown, and stolen forth this morning to perfect some innocent plot ofpeace-making? In furtherance of which she now cunningly remained at home,thus leaving Damaris free to offer renewal of favour or withhold it asshe pleased. Was not that deliciously characteristic of Aunt Felicia andher permanent effort to serve two masters--to make everybody happy, and,regardless of conflicting interests, everybody else too?--Well, Damariswas ready to fulfil her wishes. She bore Theresa no ill-will. Aninclination to grudge or resentment seemed to her unworthy. WhateverTheresa's tiresomenesses, they were over and done with, surely, quiteimmensely long ago.

The hymn given out and the tune of it played through, the assemblyscraped and rustled to its feet. Damaris standing, in height overtoppingher neighbours, discreetly turned her head. Let her eyes rest an instant,smiling, upon the upturned polished countenances of the two smallPatches--shyly watching her--and then seek a more distant goal. Yes,veritably Theresa Bilson in the flesh--very much in the flesh, full offace and plump of bosom, gold-rimmed glasses gleaming, her mouth openedwide in song. It was a little astonishing to see her so unchanged. Forhow much had happened since the day of that choir-treat, at Harchester,which marked her deposition, the day of Damaris' sleep in the sunshineand awakening in the driving wet out on the Bar.--The day wherein so muchbegan, and so much ended, slashed across and across with an extravaganceof lasting joy and lasting pain!--In the sense of it all Damaris lostherself a little, becoming forgetful of her existing situation. Shelooked past, over Theresa and beyond.

At the extreme end of the church, in the last of the free seats wherethe light from the west door streamed inward, a man's figure detacheditself with singular distinctness from the background of whitewashedwall. He, too, overtopped his fellows, and that by several inches. Andfrom the full length of the building, across the well-filled benches, hisglance sought and met that of Damaris, and held it in fearless, highsecurity of affection not to be gainsaid.

The nice, clean-shining little Patches, still watching shyly out of theirbrown, glossy, mouse-like eyes, to their extreme mystification saw thecolour flood Damaris' face, saw her lips tremble and part as in preludeto happy speech. Then saw her grow very pale, and, turning away, clutchat the head of the alert little hound. Mrs. Cooper delivered herself of aquite audible whisper to the effect--"that Miss Damaris was tookfaint-like, as she feared." And Mary leaned forward over the front of thepew in quick anxiety. But our maiden's weakness was but passing. Shestraightened herself, stood tall and proudly again, looking at the knightand his lady lying so peacefully side by side upon their marble couch.She gathered them into her gladness--they somehow sympathized, she felt,in her present sweet and poignant joy. Her soul had known best, had beenright in its homing--since Faircloth was here--was here.

That sweet, poignant joy flooded her, so that she wordlessly gave thanksand praise. He was in life--more, was within sight of her, hearing thesame sounds, breathing the same air. Across the short dividing space,spirit had embraced spirit. He claimed her.--Had not his will, indeed,far more than any curiosity regarding the identity of poor, plump littleTheresa, compelled her to look around?

She demanded nothing further, letting herself dwell in a perfection ofcontent--without before or after--possible only to the pure in heart andto the young.

The hymn concluded, Damaris knelt, while Reginald Sawyer, having mountedinto the pulpit, read the invocation; mechanically rose from her kneeswith the rest, and disposed herself in the inner corner of the pew,sitting sideways so that her left hand might rest upon the carven marblemargin of the tomb. She liked touch of it still, in the quietude of hergreat content, cherishing a pretty fancy of the knight and his lady'ssympathy and that also of their sprightly little footstool dog.

Otherwise she was deaf to outward things, deliciously oblivious, wrappedaway sweetly within herself. Hence she quite failed to notice howawkwardly Sawyer stumbled, treading on the fronts of his long surplicewhen going up the pulpit stairs. How he fumbled with his manuscript ashe flattened it out on the cushioned desk. Or how husky was his voice,to the point of the opening sentences being almost inaudible. The youngclergyman suffered, indeed, so it appeared, from a painfully excessivefit of nervousness. All this she missed, not awakening from her state ofblissful trance until the sermon had been under way some good five toten minutes.

Her awakening even then was gradual. It was also unpleasant. It began invague and uneasy suspicion of something unusual and agitating toward. Inconsciousness of a hushed and strained attention, very foreign to thecustomary placid, not to say bovine, indifference of the ordinary countrycongregation. The preacher's voice was audible enough now, in good truth,though still under insufficient control. It roared, cracked upward,approaching a scream. Sentences trod on one another's heels, so rapid washis delivery; or bumped and jolted so overlaid was it with emphasis. He,dealt in ugly words, too--"lies, drunkenness, theft, profanity;" andworse still, "uncleanness, adultery, carnal debauchery." For not venialsins only, but mortal sins likewise were rife in Deadham, as he averred,matters of common knowledge and everyday occurrence--tolerated if notopenly encouraged, callously winked at. The public conscience couldhardly be said to exist, so indurated was it, so moribund through lack ofstimulation and through neglect. Yet such wickedness, sooner or later,must call down the vengeance of an offended God. It would be taken uponthese lawbreakers. Here or hereafter these evil-livers would receive thechastisement their deeds invited and deserved. Let no man deceivehimself. God is just. He is also very terrible in judgment. Hell yawnsfor the impenitent.

Breathless, he paused; and a subdued sigh, an instinctive shuffling offeet ran through the assembly.--Yet these were but generalities afterall, often heard before, when you came to think, though seldom soforcibly put. Every man made liberal gift of such denunciations to hisneighbours, rather than applied their lesson to himself. But ReginaldSawyer was merely gathering energy, gathering courage for more detailedassault. He felt nervous to the verge of collapse--a new and reallyhorrible experience. His head was hot, his feet cold. The temptationsimply and crudely to give in, bundle down the pulpit stairs and bolt,was contemptibly great. His eyesight played tricks on him. Below there,in the body of the church, the rows of faces ran together into irregularpink blots spread meaninglessly above the brown of the oaken pews, thebrown, drab, and black, too, of their owners' Sunday best. Here andthere a child's light frock or white hat intruded upon the prevailingneutral tints; as did, in a startling manner, Damaris Verity'srusset-red plume and suit.

Time and again, since he began his sermon, had that dash of rich colourdrawn his reluctant attention. He recoiled from, oddly dreaded it--nowmore than ever, since to him it rather mercilessly focussed the subjectand impending climax of his denunciatory address.

The pause began to affect the waiting congregation, which stirreduneasily. Some one coughed. And Sawyer was a sufficiently practisedspeaker to know that, once you lose touch with an audience, it is next toimpossible successfully to regain your ascendency over it. Unless he wasprepared to accept ignominious defeat he must brace himself, or it wouldbe too late. He abominated defeat. Therefore, summoning all his nativecombativeness, he took his own fear by the throat, straightened hismanuscript upon the desk, and vehemently broke forth into speech.

--Did his hearers deny or doubt the truth of his assertions, suppose thathe spoke at random, or without realization of the heavy responsibilityhe incurred in advancing such accusations? They were in error, so he toldthem. He advanced no accusations which he could not justify by exampleschosen from among themselves, from among residents in this parish. Hewould be false to his duty both to them--his present audience--and to hisand their Creator, were he to abstain from giving those examples out ofrespect of persons. Other occupants of this pulpit might have--he fearedhad--allowed worldly considerations to influence and silence them.

A nasty cut this, at the poor vicar-canon, increasingly a prey todistracted fidgets, sitting helpless in the chancel.

But of such pusillanimity, such time-serving, he--ReginaldSawyer--scorned to be guilty. The higher placed the sinner, the moreheinous the sin.--He would deal faithfully with all, since not only wasthe salvation of each one in jeopardy, but his own salvation was in perillikewise, inasmuch as, at the dread Last Assize, he would be required togive account of his stewardship in respect of this sinful place.

Thus far Damaris had listened in deepening distaste. Surely the young manvery much magnified his office, was in manner exaggerated, in matteraggressive and verbose? Notwithstanding its attempted solemnity and heat,his sermon seemed to be conventional, just a "way of talking," and aconceited one at that. But, as he proceeded to set forth his promisedexamples of local ill-living, distaste passed into bewilderment andfinally into a sense of outrage, blank and absolute. He named no names,and wrapped his statements up in Biblical language. Yet they remainedsuggestive and significant enough. He spoke, surely, of those whosehonour was dearest to her, whom she boundlessly loved. Under plea ofrebuking vice, he laid bare the secrets, violated the sanctities of theirprivate lives. Yet was not that incredible? All decencies of custom andusage forbade it, stamped such disclosure as unpermissible, fantastic. Hemust be mad, or she herself mad, mishearing, misconceiving him.

"Adulterous father, bastard son--publican sheltering youthful offendersfrom healthy punishment in the interests of personal gain."--Of that lastshe made nothing, failed to follow it. But the rest?--

It was true, too. But not as he represented it, all its tragic beauty,all the nobleness which tempered and, in a measure at least, discountedthe great wrong of it, stripped away--leaving it naked, torn from itssetting, without context and so without perspective. Against this notonly her tenderness, but sense of justice, passionately fought. He madeit monstrous and, in that far, untrue, as caricature is untrue, cryingaloud for explanation and analysis. Yet who could explain? Circumstancesof time and place rendered all protest impossible. Nothing could be done,nothing said. Thus her beloved persons were exposed, judged, condemnedunheard, without opportunity of defence.

And realizing this, realizing redress hopelessly barred, she cowereddown, her head bowed, almost to the level of the marble couch whereon thefigures of knight and lady reposed in the high serenity of love anddeath. Happier they than she, poor child, for her pride trailed in thedust, her darling romance of brother and sister and all the rare pietiesof her heart, defiled by a shameful publicity, exposed for every Tom,Dick and Harry to paw over and sneer at!

Horror of a crowd, which watches the infliction of some signal disgrace,tormented her imagination, moreover, to the temporary breaking of herspirit. Whether that crowd was, in the main, hostile or sympatheticmattered nothing. The fact that it silently sat there, silently observed,made every member of it, for the time, her enemy. Even the trustedservants just behind, comfortable comely Mary, soft Mrs. Cooper, thedevoted Patch, were hateful to her as the rest. Their very loyalty--whichshe for no instant doubted--went only to fill the cup of her humiliationto the brim.

Reginald Sawyer's voice continued; but what he said now she neither heardnor cared. Her martyrdom could hardly suffer augmentation, the wholeworld seemed against her, she set apart, pilloried.--But not alone.Faircloth was set apart, pilloried, also. And remembering this, hercourage revived. The horror of the crowd lifted. For herself she couldnot fight; but for him she could fight, with strength and conviction, outof the greatness of her love for him, out of her recognition that theignominy inflicted upon him was more bitter, more cruel, than anyinflicted upon her. For those who dare, in a moment the worst can turnbest.--She would make play with the freedom which this breach ofconvention, of social reticence, of moral discretion, conferred upon her.The preacher had gone far in demolition. She would go as far, andfurther, in construction, in restitution. Would openly acknowledge thebond which joined Faircloth to her and to her people, by openly claiminghis protection now, in this hour of her disgrace and supreme dismay. Shewould offer no excuse, no apology. Only there should be no more attemptedconcealment or evasion of the truth on her part, no furtiveness in hisand her relation. Once and for all she would make her declaration, cry itfrom the house-top in fearless yet tender pride.

Damaris stood up, conspicuous in her red dress amid that rather drabassembly as a leaping flame. She turned about, fronting the perplexed andagitated congregation, her head carried high, her face austere for allits youthful softness, an heroic quality, something, indeed, superlativeand grandiose in her bearing and expression, causing a shrinking in thosewho saw her and a certain sense of awe.

Her eyes sought Faircloth again. Found him, and unfalteringly spoke withhim, bidding him claim her as she, claimed him, bidding him come. Whichbidding he obeyed; and that at the same rather splendid level ofsentiment, worthily sustaining her abounding faith in him. For a touch ofthe heroic and superlative was present in his bearing and expression,also, as he came up the church between the well-filled pews--thesetenanted, to left and right, by some who figured in his daily life,figured in his earliest recollections, by others, newcomers, to him, evenby sight, barely known; yet each and all, irrespective of age, rank, andposition, affecting his outlook and mental atmosphere in some particular,as every human personality does and must, with whom one's life, ever sotransiently, is thrown. Had he had time to consider them, this cloud ofwitnesses might have proved disturbing even to his masterful will andsteady nerve. But he had not time. There was for him--so perfectly--thesingle object, the one searching yet lovely call to answer, the one actto be performed.

Reaching the front pew upon the gospel side, Darcy Faircloth tookDamaris' outstretched hand. He looked her in the eyes, his ownworshipful, ablaze at once with a great joy and a great anger; and thenled her back, down the length of the aisle, through the west door intothe liberty of the sunshine and the crisp northerly wind outside.

Standing here, the houses and trees of the village lay below them. Thewhole glinting expanse of the Haven was visible right up to the town ofMarychurch gathered about its long-backed Abbey, whose tower, tall and ineffect almost spectral, showed against the purple ridges of forest andmoorland beyond. Over the salt marsh in the valley, a flock of ploversdipped and wheeled, their backs and wide flapping wings black, till, inturning, their breasts and undersides flashed into snow and pearl.

And because brother and sister, notwithstanding diversities of upbringingand of station, were alike children of the open rather than of cities,born to experiment, to travel and to seafaring round this ever-spinningglobe, they instinctively took note of the extensive, keen thoughsun-gilded prospect--before breaking silence and giving voice to theemotion which possessed them--and, in so doing, found refreshment and abrave cleansing to their souls.

Still holding Faircloth's hand, and still silent, her shoulder touchinghis now and again in walking, Damaris went down the sloping path, hoarylichen-stained head-and-foot stones set in the vivid churchyard grass--asyet unbleached by the cold of winter--on either side. The sense of hisstrength, of the fine unblemished vigour of his young manhood, hereclose beside her--so strangely her possession and portion of her naturalinalienable heritage--filled her with confident security and with arestful, wondering calm. So that the shame publicly put on her to shedits bitterness, her horror of the watching crowd departed, fading outinto unreality. Though still shaken, still quivering inwardly from theordeal of the past hour, she already viewed that shame and horror as butaccidents to be lived down and disregarded, by no means as essentialelements in the adventurous and precious whole. Presently they wouldaltogether lose their power to wound and to distress her, while thisfreedom and the closer union, gained by means of them, continuedimmutable and fixed.

It followed that, when in opening the churchyard gate and holding it backfor her to pass, Faircloth perforce let go her hand and, the spell ofcontact severed, found himself constrained to speak at last, saying:

"You know you have done a mighty splendid, dangerous thing--no less thanburned your boats--and that in the heat of generous impulse, blind,perhaps--I can't but fear so--to the heavy cost."

Damaris could interrupt him, with quick, sweet defiance:

"But there is no cost!"

And, to drive home the sincerity of her disclaimer, and further reassurehim, she took his hand again and held it for an instant close against herbosom, tears and laughter together present in her eyes.

"Ah! you beautiful dear, you beautiful dear," Faircloth cried, brokenly,as in pain, somewhat indeed beside himself. "Before God, I come nearblessing that blatant young fool and pharisee of a parson since he hasbrought me to this."

Then he put her a little way from him, penetrated by fear lest the whitelove which--in all honour and reverence--he was bound to hold her in,should flush ever so faintly, red.

"For, after all, it is up to me," he said, more to himself than to her,"to make very sure there isn't, and never--by God's mercy--shall be,any cost."

And with that--for the avoidance of the congregation, now streamingrather tumultuously out of church--they went on across the village green,hissed at by slow waddling, hard-eyed, most conceited geese, to the lanewhich leads down to the causeway and warren skirting the river-bank.

CHAPTER IV

WHEREIN MISS FELICIA VERITY CONCLUSIVELY SHOWS WHAT SPIRIT SHE IS OF

Her attraction consisted in her transparency, in the eager simplicitywith which she cast her home-made nets and set her innocuous springes.To-day Miss Felicia was out to wing the Angel of Peace, and crowd thatcelestial messenger into the arms of Damaris and Theresa Bilsoncollectively and severally. Such was the major interest of the hour. But,for Miss Felicia the oncoming of middle-age by no means condemned thelesser pleasures of life to nullity. Hence the minor interest of the hourcentred in debate as to whether or not the thermometer justified herwearing a coat of dark blue silk and cloth, heavily trimmed with ruchingsand passementerie, reaching to her feet. A somewhat sumptuous garmentthis, given her by Sir Charles and Damaris last winter in Madrid. Shefancied herself in it greatly, both for the sake of the dear donors, andbecause the cut of it was clever, disguising the over-narrowness of hermaypole-like figure and giving her a becoming breadth and fulness.

She decided in favour of the coveted splendour; and at about aquarter-past twelve strolled along the carriage-drive on her way to thegoose green and the village street. There, or thereabouts, unless herplot lamentably miscarried, she expected to meet her niece and thatniece's ex-governess-companion, herded in amicable converse by thepinioned Angel of Peace. Her devious and discursive mind fluttered to andfro, meanwhile, over a number of but loosely connected subjects.

Of precisely what, upon a certain memorable occasion, had taken placebetween her brother, Sir Charles, and poor Theresa--causing the latterto send up urgent signals of distress to which she, Miss Felicia,instantly responded--she still was ignorant. Theresa had, she feared,been just a wee bit flighty, leaving Damaris unattended while herselfmildly gadding. But such dereliction of duty was insufficient to accountfor the arbitrary fashion in which she had been sent about her business,literally--the word wasn't pretty--chucked out! Miss Felicia alwayssuspected there must be _something_, she would say _worse_--it soundedharsh--but something _more_ than merely that. Her interpretations ofpeculiar conduct were liable to run in terms of the heart. Had Theresa,poor thing, by chance formed a hopeless attachment?--Hopeless, of course,almost ludicrously so; yet what more natural, more comprehensible,Charles being who and what he was? Not that he would, in the faintestdegree, lend himself to such misplaced affection. Of that he wasincapable. The bare idea was grotesque. He, of course, was guiltless.But, assuming there _was_ a feeling on Theresa's side, wasn't she equallyguiltless? She could not help being fascinated.--Thus Miss Felicia wasbound to acquit both. Alike they left the court without a stain on theirrespective characters.

Not for worlds would she ever dream of worrying Charles by attempting toreintroduce poor Theresa to his notice. But with Damaris it wasdifferent. The idea that any persons of her acquaintance were at sixesand sevens, on bad terms, when, with a little good will on their partand tactful effort upon hers, they might be on pleasant ones was to heractively afflicting. To drop an old friend, or even one notconspicuously friendly if bound to you by associations and habit,